Battle for the Church | Dr. Ed Young

[Music] we are a post-christian culture a post-christian culture soon becomes an anti-christian culture and this is exactly where we are what is the answer can we look to the corporate world to give us answers no they sold out a long time ago haven't they can we look at the world of education say they're going to stand up no they've they've lost it they sold out to postmodernism a long time ago can we look to government we know where they stand can we look to any entity that we have any element in our society and say they're going to stand up now against the godlessness that we see in filtrating every area of life who is going to stand the only entity that is standing against total godless secular humanism in america is the church and by the way not just the church many of our entities that are still called the church are no longer the church because they had so compromised with the culture on life on family on moral principles on gender in order to be accepted by the culture so many who have steeples and crosses say we're the church and they're no longer the church and they will not stand because they've already sold out what will be the element that will stand the evangelical church that is under the authority of the word of god alone will stand martin neil muller christian leader in germany when hitler came to power he said they took away the communists but i was not a communist so i didn't say anything he said then they came for the socialist and i was not a socialist so i did not say anything he said then they came for the trade guilds and i was not a member of the trade guild so i didn't say anything he said then they came for the jews and i was not a jew and i didn't say anything he said then they came for the christians and the church and that was who i was and he said it was too late because i had no one left to take up my cause what is the answer in the whole swell of the tide of public opinion and we find ourselves upside down in a world that is a part of the twilight zone and we're swimming upstream what is the answer the answer is the body of christ the church let me tell you his story remind you of it i'll go through it rapidly in pre-history there was god the father god the son god the holy spirit and they were in a love love-love relationship they were in perfect community perfect community adam and eve were given life and they became one as god the father god the son the trinity was one and then they included adam and eve in that and now adam and eve in relationship with the trinity they had the perfect relationship vertically and horizontally with one another we know the snake came and then that broke the relationship between this couple and god and it broke the relationship between one another because eve blamed the serpent and adam blamed eve and there we go the community the oneness that god asked for no longer existed and then we see the development of the human race and it rapidly goes downhill until there was that infamous tower of babel was built when all the people gathered there with one language and they looked up and said we will reach all the way to heaven because we control our lives only on the horizontal area no understanding of the upward look but god came and broke down that tower and scattered all of humanity all over the earth giving them different languages and that was the end of genesis chapter 11 all before was the prime evil part of history right and then begin with genesis 12 god did a new thing he brought in a new covenant and by faith abraham stepped out and began a new people the israelites the jewish people and they were given clear instructions as how they should live and how they should worship but we see in the jews they forgot they were blessed to be a blessing incidentally the same thing we have forgotten in the united states of america the same thing blessed to be a blessing and then what happened there was blessing there was rebellion there was judgment there was repentance there was blessing and that cycle went on and on and on for generations in the jewish world until in the fullness of time god in his amazing love fulfill prophecy and we have christmas christmas the word became flesh the incarnation and then we know jesus said caesarea philippi with his apostles who do you think i am who do you say i am peter said you're the christ the messiah the promised one the son of god and jesus looked at him and said flesh and blood didn't tell you that peter but on that rock i will build my church not on peter but on the profession of faith he made in jesus christ and then jesus said on that profession of faith in jesus christ i will build my what church and he said even the gates of hell cannot keep the church out so the answer today in our twilight zone in our broken culture in our bleeding abused america in a postmodern post-religious era we have today is the church and then we see the church was born jesus crucified and on that cross we have a new relationship the vertical part of the cross reaches up to heaven and gets us right with god vertically the horizontal part of the cross gets us right with one another and there you have the foundation of the church the profession of faith man in right relationship with one another and man in right relationship with god and then on the day of pentecost the real birthday of the church the holy spirit had come and now people were speaking from all over the world the same language they were understanding one another in the same language as peter delivered that great magnificent sermon so you say pentecost is reversal of babel do you get that bible where the language were changed and scattered now they come together to hear what god has done for man in jesus christ so now we have the church let me tell you something about the church the church when it is functioning as the lord god intends for it to function what does that mean it means that we're brothers and sisters in jesus christ what does that mean that means we're an awesome body of faith what does that mean that means that we're all practicing in the church so one another's we love one another we forgive one another we care for one another the one and others are operating it means that the spiritual gifts that god gives to those who receive christ are operating in the life of the church and you have a powerful entity of people who are in the family of god and it is that church that body of believers that will make a difference and will reach out and seek to heal and to save and to reach a broken dying culture it is the church the authentic church that we see in the bible functioning as it should it is absolutely invincible it's christ his hands his feet his mind his body operating today right now where we are in this culture it is the church now the question is how do we speak to the culture how do you and i engage the culture if god has given to the body of christ the answer how do we communicate that what voice do we use what vehicle do we have to communicate how lives can be changed and families can be healed and morality can return and there'll be a true understanding of god who he is what kind of voice will we use i think we'll have to use the prophetic voice you find the prophetic voice being used in acts chapter number two i referred to it it's peter's sermon at pentecost it was a voice like jeremiah thus saith the lord now look at the culture in which peter was addressing the people it was a jewish family it was a jewish culture thousands gathered as he spoke full of the holy spirit and they came from all over the world and they heard as if they all knew one language and what was that message it was a message to a people who already believe in a monotheistic god right of people who already understand the moral requirements and the commandments of people who already understood the role and the mission of the world they understood the old testament they had they absorbed the old testament they knew the torah the shema was there presented every night in all the families all through jewish history and so they were ready and peter stood up with a prophetic voice thus saith the lord what did he say repent and unzip your life unzip your life and receive jesus christ and let him run your life a message of the resurrection and a message of repentance and you see he could speak as a prophet because they would get it that's acts chapter 2. now flip over the book of acts and read acts chapter 17. paul is in athens totally different world from jerusalem and he walks around athens and he sees a radically different culture they had gods and goddesses and temples and statues and all kinds of indication of all kinds of religion in fact they had a god for every day of the week by the way every day of the week sunday monday tuesday wednesday thursday friday saturday is named after a pagan god don't forget that and they had a god to every one of these and so paul looked around and and he got on mars hill and all the philosophers and those who were interested came to hear something new oh how they wanted something new and paul said you know i've looked around your city and you are very religious no no no city in the world is more religious than athens and he said i see you've got uh temples and to all the gods and goddesses but he said you have one to an unknown god a god that you don't know he said i've come to tell you that god's name and he began almost like romans 1 in an apologetic way speaking to them so that they understood they didn't know moses they didn't know anything about the old testament they were not a worshipping people the true and living god and so he approached it entirely different different culture right jerusalem radically different from athens and now in acts chapter 17 he didn't use the prophetic approach he used an evangelistic approach there at that time the language was different now in our culture some with a general religious background we know the terms but so many today do not know the religious terms so we don't use acts 2 we use acts 17 sometimes we use two sometimes we use 17. some way times we take peter's approach sometimes we take paul's approach to understand i love to tell the story we first came here 42 years ago and my son cliff was six years old and i think we had about seven people in nurseries my first sunday and fewer that in children's area and so cliff was there and a bible teacher asked a little class of six-year-olds he said if any of you know anything about moses cliff shot his hand up nobody else moved and the teacher thought well the preacher's kid they just moved here from south carolina he knows about moses said cliff tell us about moses he says moses malone the center for the houston rockets my point is don't miss it don't miss it it is that the words we use the background we use have to be appropriate for that particular setting for that particular individual for that particular culture so we speak what with their prophetic voice thus saith the lord like jeremiah like peter at pentecost but also we speak with an evangelistic voice so people understand the terminology in which we use and in all this in the whole book of acts and i've read a large hunk of it this very week i noticed that paul and peter used a different kind of approach of the church depending on where they were what paul did at ephesus totally different what he did at corinth and what paul did at laodicea was totally different what he did in rome and so we have to understand we not only have to have a prophetic voice acts 2 an evangelistic voice acts 17 but an a discerning voice discerning we know where we are we know what we're dealing with there has to be a discerning voice if the church is to be bold and make a difference in the twilight zone in the broken culture in which you and i awaken one day and find ourselves looking around saying well what happened what happened jesus came john chapter 1 full of grace and what else truth he came full of grace and said with me truth full of grace and let me tell you something if you only have grace that's your heart it'll not make it if you only have truth at your head it'll not make it when we address the culture we have to use grace and truth grace becomes soft and mushy but you have to have truth there with it and all of this is encompassed with love love without truth is a deadly thing did you get that love without truth love is robbed of something that's essential you have a child in the bathtub and he wants to take the toaster into the bathtub and plug it in well grace says man we'll let him do whatever he wants to but truth says i'd better take that toast away from him or he might get electrocuted that's where we are remember we said it over and over again we accept anybody and everybody but we do not affirm all the life choices people have made this is where the church is this is what we're about full of grace full of truth as was the lord and savior jesus christ but discernment there needs to be a wake-up call for all of us who are at the body of christ if the church is to be militant and strike out against the broken culture in which we live do you know the word microaggression heard that word heard trigger words trigger words you see in our culture there is an overwhelming effort to keep the church behind the stained glass and the steel as long as we stay inside here and doesn't move out there we'll be okay and inside here we'd better not be engaged in what will be called and is called quote hate speech microaggressive how does this play out university indiana a student gets up in a class he reports on a book entitled listen carefully now don't don't be unmisunderstood he reports on a book entitled notre dame versus the clan and this book clearly dramatically tells about the courage in 1924 of notre dame students who stood up and they dealt with the ku klux klan viciously exposed them as an organization that was godless that was racist that was vicious that was of the devil that's the thesis of the book he reported on that book but in the book there was a picture of a clan rally and someone got on the internet and said boy this student reported on a book and they had a picture of clan riley and they so gathered around him and ostracized that student now now gets the context this book clearly blasts and talks about the courage of standing against racism and white supremacy but they took him before a tribunal there at notre dame and they convicted him of racism we are moving in this area of trigger words and microaggression that's where we are in the 21st century howard k smith some of you remember him an icon of broadcast news he said the news will not tell you what to think but the news will teach you what to think about september morning 1997 cnn news which dominated the news at that time cnn news they opened their morning news broadcast with a story about princess diana she'd been killed a week before and they spent 10 minutes right in the opening talking about princess diana and one commentator said it was the most important loss of life in the last 50 years and they extol her they play the chimes that were played all over great britain when she was killed and they gave some epitaph a little word from those who testified at her funeral and then they played a song that elton john had written in honor of die and played at her funeral but they just extolled her show pictures of children crying and candles burning man her death was so worldwide catastrophe it just broke the heart of the world and then they went on with their news cnn that morning not much news they gave news of near a space station they talked about a hurricane that was brewing in the gulf then they gave some sports reports they had some more talking heads and they went through the whole day of news and cnn and finally they signed off sort of a no news day you would think but you see the night before that news day in cnn a little old lady from albania had died mother teresa not one word not one word about the woman who is arguably the most beloved woman in the world the winner of the nobel prize a woman who spent her life in the streets of calcutta in the land of the dying and she'd take the nobodies the throwaways by the thousands upon thousands and love them and minister unto them and feed them and tell them about christ all those years a life totally sacrificed not one word are you tired of being an owl an owl is loves the darkness despises the light an owl would like to stay in the darkness all the time and there'd never be sunrise that's an owl or you like a rooster who gets up in the morning when the sun comes up and awakens everybody with a rooster's crow over and over ago and saying get up and go and move out and become something listen in the twilight zone of our culture ladies and gentlemen you'd better take all the influence how much influence do you have how much influence do you have how much influence do you have don't save it any longer don't hold back any longer don't say well i don't want to offend you may have to use the prophetic voice the evangelistic voice always a discerning voice but take all the influence you have at this moment in history and use it for god for the kingdom and the church become roosters that says wake up america wake up america [Music] you

Channel: The Winning Walk

Views: 4,462

Keywords: The Winning Walk, Dr. Ed Young, Ed Young, Radio, Broadcast, winningwalk.org, ed young ministries, ed young sermons, SBCHouston, TBN, Television, bible, Discover, Transformation, Gifts

Id: IVYDScwuhHE

Length: 26min 18sec (1578 seconds)

Published: Sat Nov 14 2020